


lay down your armor.

by izzyasavestheday (stilessexual)



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-01
Updated: 2016-01-01
Packaged: 2018-05-10 21:10:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,944
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5601091
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stilessexual/pseuds/izzyasavestheday
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>His eyes were ancient. His soul had witnessed a hundred lives before this one and it had loved her in every one of them. </p><p>"We gave everything for this. We gave up our hopes and our sanity. We never got to be selfish.” His voice cracked something awful.  “I wanna be selfish, Clarke. Just once.”  </p><p>There's love, and there's love.</p>
            </blockquote>





	lay down your armor.

Clarke is, god, she’s tired. Clarke’s tired. She’s so fucking tired.

She carries it with her everywhere she goes. The people she’s killed. The people she let down. The people she will undoubtedly let down. The people, somehow after all her screw ups, still counting on her. Her entire being was heavy with the weight of it.

She closes her eyes against the rising sun. She turned 25 today. She’s been on Earth for seven years. Seven long, hard years. She felt the unfamiliar prickle of tears behind her eyes. She doesn’t remember the last time she cried. She doesn’t remember the last time she had the time or luxury to cry. The tears spilt white hot. She felt swollen everywhere –from her heart, to her eyes, to her very core.  

She missed music. She missed her parents. She missed Wells.

There was the near silent sound of bare feet padding along the sand behind her and years worth of near death experiences had her swiftly shifting and aiming her weapon at the source.

“Easy, princess.”

Bellamy. Bellamy. Bellamy. Bellamy. Bellamy.

Bellamy.

She lowered her gun, steady as ever. He wasn’t scared, or even really startled at her reaction. He knew her. He knew her better than anyone, better than her own mother had known her, and he knew she’d never fire a shot without complete certainty that the person standing at the other end of her gun was an enemy.

“Good morning,” she didn’t bother with smiling or even wiping her tears. He _knew_ her. Clarke has never had to be someone she wasn’t with him –at her lowest and dirtiest and smallest, Bellamy Blake knew her and has yet to abandon her. She felt her entire body warm at his presence, like he was her own personal sun. It should’ve been worrying, how attuned her body was to him but she stopped questioning her reaction to him years ago. It is what it is.

He didn’t say anything else as he settled down next to her, just smiled crookedly and watched the sun rise and color the ocean bloody and beautiful. She leaned against him for support. Clarke cried properly for the first time in years.

“I’m 25 today,” she finally croaked. She sounded raw. She sounded like the way she imagined her insides looked.  

“I know dumbass,” he replied with a soft laugh. He reached beside him for a package she hadn’t noticed before. “Happy birthday.”

It was paper –paper he’d made himself. There was paint that he’d made from berries and flowers and beautiful boar brushes with tiny designs etched into the wood. This must have taken him months. She felt her throat close up all over again. She hadn’t picked up a brush since the Mountain. Years. Years. It’s been years. She didn’t know if her hands knew how to paint anymore. “Oh, Bellamy. _Bellamy.”_

Once, a little over a year ago, a grounder told her that she said his name like a prayer.

She looked up at him, tears still streaming. “Thank you,” she whispered. It wasn’t enough. It was never enough, but god, she tried to put everything in that word. He roughly pressed his lips to her forehead. Bellamy got up and left before she could utter another word.

\--

Clarke surrounded with people was a different Clarke. (Bellamy didn’t count as people.) She was poised and smart and dangerous. There were clans far out, across the ocean, far back into the mountains, that whispered her name. Clans that spat it like a curse. Clarke Griffin of the Sky people. Clarke Griffin that killed her own before she let anyone else have them. Clarke Griffin the woman who brought the Mountain people to their knees only to destroy them. Clarke Griffin the healer. Clarke Griffin the destroyer. Clarke Griffin the avenger.

“Tell them in exchange for their help and hospitality, I will be available once a week to come and heal their sick and wounded. We will also share our technology with them, so that their hunts may be safer.”

Clarke Griffin the gentle.

Their clan was close enough and these people had risked their lives for _her_.  

The young girl’s eyes widened. Smith, Clarke silently admonished herself. The girl’s name was Smith. Every name was important. Every soul was worth remembering. They all deserved it.

Octavia herself taught Smith the languages and dialects of the grounders in the areas surrounding them –just in case she was away when they needed her. Which was just as well because this came to Smith like breathing, and Octavia was always away on one diplomatic mission or another. Clarke suddenly missed Octavia like an aching. She sent a pleading wish to the skies that she and Lincoln would come home soon.

“Ma’am,” Smith’s voice was as smooth as silk. “Are you sure?”

 From the corner of her eye, Clarke spied the tell-tale jump in Bellamy’s jaw; he disagreed with her decision. Despite that, they were both well aware that a string of unfortunate events had left this clan full of children and elderly. Bellamy may have stood by her rigid and seemingly unyielding, but he knew that for the first time since they came to Earth they were in the position of power. They were in the position to help.

Clarke looked at him and waited. She’d wait for him ‘till the end of time if she had to.

He cleared his throat roughly, “I’m with you.”

It also didn’t hurt that the clan had saved Clarke’s life.

She smiled at Smith, “It’s the least we can offer them after what they did for us. For me.”

Smith held her gaze for a second longer, and nodded firmly. She translated smoothly, words sounding like liquid gold on her tongue. The leaders of the clan smiled ancient smiles. One of the elders, a woman so old that her back could no longer straighten itself out stepped forward and clasped Clarke’s hands. She gently tugged Clarke down, and whispered –accented English perfect, no surprise– in her ear.

“You’ve proven yourself time and time again, Clarke of the Sky people.” She whispered. “The Sea clan will never forget your kindness or your bravery. May the blessings of the gods rain upon you, child. May they rain down love and happiness upon you and your warrior-love.”

She pressed a gnarled hand to the flat of Clarke’s stomach and smiled wide. “I smell children on you. Three, maybe more, but no less than three.”   

The Sea clan were renowned across the land for the accuracy of their prophecies. Clarke knew the woman could feel the tremble in hands. She patted her face, calm as ever.

“Don’t worry, child. You’ll raise warriors.”

\--

 “Clarke, _Clarke_.” Bellamy rushed to keep up with her. “What’s wrong? What happened? Talk to me, damnit, Clarke.”

He said her name so much. So much. After an incident four years ago, some dumb kid called her princess and Bellamy broke his nose –well, he only ever called her princess when they were alone. It was theirs, now.  

It wasn’t even Finn’s anymore.

She stopped running, and stared up at him. She stared up at his beautiful face. She had to draw him one day. She just had to get the contours of his cheeks down on paper. Immortalize him somehow because it’d be a damn shame if a face like that went to waste. She wanted people hundreds of years from now to see his damn face and be in awe of it.   

“What happened?” he asked again. His voice was so low. Clarke closed her eyes to savor it. She felt like she was going into shock.

She laughed, humorlessly. “Have you ever thought of having children?”

He didn’t react at her question. He only did that when he was being very, very careful with her.

“Where is this coming from?” Bellamy was only this gentle with Octavia. And her. Bellamy was only ever this gentle with Octavia, and Clarke. “What did that woman say to you?”

“I have,” she went on like she hadn’t heard him. “I used to think about being a mother all the damn time. I really wanted it, Bellamy. But I don’t deserve to be a mother.”

“Clarke—

“I’ve taken so many lives,” she gasped out. She could see them, face by face, name by name. “So many people have died at my hand. Because of my plans—

“Please, listen to me.” He whispered. “Please—

“I’m unworthy,” Clarke nearly wailed. She clamped her mouth shut, to swallow her near screams. “I’m unworthy of having a child.”

He grabbed her face in his too large hands, forced her to look him in the eyes.

“Clarke,” he rasped, pained and just as tired as her. He’d been through just as much, seen just as much, if not more than her. “Clarke, you are not unworthy. You are not unworthy. You are not unlovable.”

She crumbled in his arms. Clarke with Bellamy had no guards and no defenses. She was nothing but rubbed raw by what the years had done to her. Clarke with Bellamy was weak. Yet, as they clutched at each other’s back, Clarke with Bellamy was strong.

\--

It’s Raven who pulls the words out of her.

“You love him.”

Finn’s been dead for what felt like centuries. She could barely remember his face. They only ever talked about it on the eve of his death where they share a bottle of Monty’s moonshine, and cry together until the sun comes up.

Raven was her best friend, her second. Raven was her backbone.

Clarke closed her eyes tightly.

Bellamy. Bellamy. Bellamy.

“Of course I love him,” she answered gruffly. “I love you all.”

Raven smiled, lopsided and beautiful and Clarke was a little bit in love with her, she didn’t know how she couldn’t be. “No, you fucking dumbass. You love him.”

Clarke pressed her fingers to her eyes. All she ever saw was Bellamy. He felt like sunlight on her skin.

“Of course I love him,” she whispered again. Raven understood. She always did. “That doesn’t change anything, Raven. I’ve loved him since the beginning.”

Raven stared at her for a beat too long. She gestured vaguely at the air around them. At the ocean. At the growing number of huts. “It’s been quiet for a while now. We’ve had peace for so long sometimes I feel like everything that happened to us is just nightmares I have every once in a while.”

Clarke’s teeth creaked.

“But I know that’s not the same for you,” Raven went on softly. “I worry about you. About him. Sometimes I think that you’ll never be able to move past what you had to do.”

Clarke stared up at the sky. It was so blue. So, so, so blue.

She loved this place.

“You’ve loved him from the start,” Raven laughed softly on an exhale. “But I do think something’s changed now. I do think you deserve the peace you’ll find with him.”

“Raven,” Clarke groaned low. “Raven, I don’t need to tell him I love him because he knows. Raven, I love Bellamy so much I don’t know who I am without that love. I feel it every day. Every second. I wake up and sleep with it. It’s not hurting me. I’m not looking for peace because I’ve found it, being his partner.”

Raven stared and stared and stared.

Clarke exhaled roughly. “It’s not worth it. It’s not worth losing him, or what we’ve built, over childish emotions. Peace doesn’t last.”

Clarke was a ways away when Raven called out.

“What if it does?”

Clarke dully wondered if her teeth would crack if she kept grinding them together.

“What if the peace lasts? What if we thrive? What if years from now you’re still alone because you’re both stupid fucking martyrs?”

Clarke walked away, but not before hearing Raven’s last few words:

“Don’t let fear stop you from being loved, Griffin.”  

\--

It all came to the day Bellamy decided he’s had enough.

He cleared his throat roughly. He was wringing his hands. Bellamy fucking Blake, the warrior-man of the Sky people, was nervously wringing his hands and pacing in front of her. Clarke couldn’t help the cheeky grin that spread across her face, at her warrior-love looking at her with his beautiful eyes. She loved that man so much, she constantly ached with it.

“Bellamy,” she gently stopped him, a laugh in her voice. “Bellamy, what is it?”

“I—

He groaned and threw his hands up to cover his face.

“Bellamy,” she repeated. She quickly ran her eyes over his body. “Are you hurt?”

“No,” He replied quickly. “No, I’m fine. I –fuck, okay, listen. Listen.”

She laughed, brows disappearing into her hairline. “I hear you,”

“It was the minute I saw you,” she opened her mouth, and he cut her off. “No, damnit, don’t talk. You talk too damn much. Just listen to me.”

She mimed zipping her mouth shut. He pressed his lips together to stop himself from grinning. She loved this. She loved the brief moments when they got to be silly and young together.

“I’m not good at this; you know that, so bear with me.” He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “You jumped down, and said we couldn’t open the doors because of one stupid ass reason or the other and I just –everything fell away. From the first day. That first second. All that noise, all my worries, every ache just fell away. Everything in my mind was quiet.”

She remembered that day as if it had just happened. She still remembered the look of him. How tired he looked, how much older his slicked back hair made him look. She remembered the way her skin thrummed around him.

“Even when I hated you,” he rasped. “I looked to you for answers. Every time everything would become too much. Too hard. Every time it hurt too much. I looked to you.”

She swallowed roughly. “I thought you said you weren’t good at this.”

He grinned and gestured vaguely around them. The ocean. The huts. The school. The clinic. There was the distant sound of laughter. The sound of children. “I thought I wouldn’t live long enough to see this. I was sure of it.”

She waited. She watched him.

“But,” he turned back to her smile as brilliant as the sun. “I did. I’m here and I’m alive and I owe every second of that to you.”

His eyes were ancient. His soul had witnessed a hundred lives before this one and it had loved her in every one of them.

“We fucked ourselves over so many times to get here. Our happiness. Our own bodies. We gave everything for this. We gave up our hopes and our sanity. We never got to be selfish.” His voice cracked something awful.  “I wanna be selfish, Clarke. Just once.”  

He opened his mouth and closed it. The air was so very still around them.

She waited.

“Clarke Griffin,” he rasped. “I love you more than words can describe. I know you know that. I know you feel the same. I know we’ve both stopped ourselves from doing anything about it for the sake of our people. For the sake of what we sacrificed to build this. I know you think your happiness isn’t worth what may happen.”

She waited.

“I don’t want to love you from a distance anymore,” his voice cracked. “If that’s not something you want, then I accept that. I care for you more than I care for my ego or my pride, or anything else at all. But, if it is something you want…”

Bellamy Blake smiled at her, the next 60 years of her life shining brightly in his eyes.

He pressed a gentle kiss to her forehead. An act they’d repeated so many times over the years it felt easier than breathing to lean into him, to take in the salt-smell that always seemed to cling to him now.

His voice was low in her hair, “take all the time you need, I’m here.”

\--

“Griffin,”

Clarke turned –elated, she already knew, she already knew– and threw herself into Octavia’s waiting arms.

It had taken years, years, and sweat, and literal blood before they forgave each other for their sins. It had taken Clarke risking her life –over and over and over again– for Bellamy’s before Octavia had admitted: “I love you because you love him.”

Clarke twined her fingers into her friend’s –sister’s —hair.  She pressed kisses to Octavia’s cheeks, her forehead, she brought up her hands and pressed kisses to her scared knuckles.

Months, months, it had been months.  

“Look,” Octavia whispered. She pressed Clarke’s hands to belly –her swollen, very pregnant belly.

“Oh,” Clarke laughed, delighted beyond measure or bounds or mere words. “Oh, my god. Oh, my god you’re having a baby. Does Bellamy know?”

Octavia nodded, happily. Her eyes did the thing that Bellamy’s did when he was happy –the crinkly, sparkling laughing eyes thing that made Clarke swallow against a painful lump in her throat.

“Have you seen a healer?” Clarke went on, not taking her hands off of Octavia’s belly. “Do you want me to check up on you? How far along are you?”

Octavia’s smile grew wider if that were possible, “Yes, Yes, the healer I saw a few villages ago said I’m due anytime in the next couple of weeks, which is why Lincoln and I decided to come home.”

Clarke nodded, nearly frantic with all the ideas running through her head. “We need to build you a bigger hut –you’re gonna need the room, and we should probably—

“Bellamy told me.”

Clarke blinked. “Told you?”

“About you not believing you’re worthy of being a mother,” Clarke tried to gently pry her hands out of Octavia’s, but the girl held on tighter. “I can’t imagine what’s going through your head, but I do know if it weren’t for you, none of us would be here. Not a single one of us.”

“Octavia,” Clarke whispered, she needed her to fully understand. “It’s not, god, it’s not just about being a mother. It’s about whose children I—

“Bellamy’s,” Octavia grinned brilliant and calm. She was teasing and suddenly a teenager again. Suddenly the first girl to step foot on earth in nearly 100 years. “You wanna have Bellamy’s babies.”

“Fuck yeah, she does.”

Clarke groaned, despite herself, as Raven joined them and pressed Octavia into a lingering hug. Arms still wrapped around each other, they turned to faced Clarke with matching expressions of glee. Octavia tugged Clarke back into their midst, her sisters wrapped their arms around her.

Safe. Safe. Safe. God, she didn’t deserve to feel this safe. This loved. This happy. This warm.

“You deserve this,” Octavia whispered into her hair. “You deserve happiness and love, Griffin.”

She looked at them, these women who had seen her horror just as Bellamy had. These women who loved her despite it.

“Clarke,” Raven smiled at her so bright, so lovely. “Clarke, I don’t know what’s going to happen tomorrow but I do know if anyone deserves a happy ending it’s you and Bellamy.”

She nodded. Pressed her lips tightly together to keep from crying. She’s been crying so fucking much lately, it’s like she’s been making up for the last few years.  

“Let it go, Griffin.” Octavia tugged on a loose strand of hair. “Whatever it is that’s stopping you, get over it.”

\--

Now that she knows, now that she knows she can, she can’t, fuck—

She doesn’t know how to tell him.

He doesn’t change. He’s still her Bellamy. He’s still her heart and soul. He still smiles at her fondly and still protects her and still loves her from a distance. (Now that he said it she doesn’t know how she could’ve ever missed it) Bellamy doesn’t change but she does. Before, she knew he was the very center of her being but she could ignore it. She was able to stifle it for the sake of their people but now she couldn’t breathe without inhaling his ocean scent. She couldn’t blink without seeing his sweet smile reflected on the insides of her eyes.

He was everywhere and she had never felt so in love with him as she did now.

Yet, she couldn’t tell him, couldn’t bring herself to say the words and cheapen the miracle that he was to her by speaking their love into existence so she—

(She let’s go. She has done so much and seen so much. She’s killed and lost her soul and found it. She will do much more for her people if need be, but here she is, still somehow young and naïve and holding on to the hope that the peace will last and he will love her despite her horror.)

So, she paints.

Clarke locked herself in her hut for hours and painted Bellamy. She painted him the way she saw him, the way she wished everyone who knew him saw him. Underneath the scarred, underneath what the years had done to him. She painted him kind, and good, and warm. She painted him with a smirk playing at his lips, shrouded in light. His hair is too long, falling into his beautiful eyes, just the way she secretly loved it. She painted his shoulders in broad stokes, the expanse of his chest, the tuck of his hips.

When he finally found her, her tank top and shorts are covered in yellows and oranges and greens. Clarke knew she had streaks across her face, probably in her hair. She stood before him, at her most safe and most vulnerable and willed him to understand everything she had no idea how to begin to express.

She handed him the painting, and he took it so gently she felt a lurch in heart. His eyes ran over it, so filled with awe, so filled with love she felt her own fill with tears once again for what felt like the hundredth time in the last few weeks.

Clarke swiped her hands across her face. “Saying it isn’t enough. I can’t just tell you I love you because you know I love you. I’ve never loved anyone the way I love you. I can’t. Bellamy—

He pressed her lips to hers. Gentle. Gentle. Gentle.

“I love you,” he whispered into her mouth. His hands were white hot underneath the fabric of her shirt. “I know that it’s just words but I’m going to keep saying these words over and over again for the rest of our lives. I love you. I love you so much.”

Clarke was still lost somewhere in the kiss. Still trying to catch up. It’s ridiculous, ridiculous, but pressing her lips to his, his breath on her face, the feel of him against her burned somewhere deep inside of her. She felt something slip, and slide into place. Home, she thought, home is where the heart is.

She slid her hands up the scarred expanse of his arm, and brought her face back to his. I love you, she thought. I love you I love you I love you—

He laughed, throaty happy everything, mouth still pressed against hers.

She held her heart in her arms and made her way home.

~

They had children.

Two boys, and a girl –all with their parents’ bad tempers and good hair.

They grew strong and tall.

The peace lasted.

Clarke loved Bellamy ‘till her dying breath.

She loved him in every lifetime since. She’ll love him in every lifetime still.

~

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> my life's a mess and I needed something happy. I hope you enjoyed this.


End file.
